Until The Final Hour

[Foxbat]

By Traudl Junge

Here is a book that tells the recollections of a 22 year-old German woman who gets herself a job as a secretary to Adolf Hitler. In late 1942, Traudl Junge went to the ‘Wolf’s Lair’ with eight other women and successfully came away with a job that put her right in the heart of the Third Reich. It is through her eyes and eloquent words that we are able to view all the main players in this crucial time. Eva Braun, The Geobbels family, the Bormans, Himmler, Speer, Goring. They are all here in an account that neither tries to justify nor blame – it just tells it as it was.

It’s a frightening, well written book – frightening in the sense that we see Hitler as courteous and kind towards the women around him – so distinctly different from the picture of the rambling maniac who murdered over six million jews – and was responsible for a war that ended over fifty million lives. Fifty Million!!! That’s a number that is beyond the normal imaginings of ordinary folk. And, as we move towards the climax of 1945 deep within his Berlin bunker, Junge neither excuses nor hides her complicity in the crimes committed by this most evil of regimes. She does claim to have not known about the Holocaust until after the war (and I believe this to be true) – but refuses to use that to exonerate herself. As she says, ignorance is no excuse.

So, what we are left with is a testament of a young woman blinded and star-struck, sleepwalking towards one of the most climactic and criminal events in Human history. A must read for everybody with an interest in the truth.

Why am I putting this review in a Science Fiction and Fantasy site? Two reasons:

1) I know there are quite a few folk here with an interest in history

2) There are also a few aspiring writers. Ever wondered how The Republic in Star Wars blindly follows the path to its own subjugation under Palpatine, or how Sauron lured the men and elves into his trap with all those rings? Read this and see how easy it is to fall under the spell of a real monster. For all the books and movies we may read, there are very few bad guys as complicated or as terrifying as Adolf Hitler.

[knivesout]

That certainly sounds fascinating. It reminds me of the colour home-movie footage of Hitler shot by his mistress Eva Braun, discovered thanks to the efforts of a couple of documentary film-makers in the 60s. These pictures showed a different side of Hitler - a Hitler who cuddled little babies, played with his dog and went on swimming expeditions and the like. It was the first time the larger world had seen anything except propaganda shots and speeches, and it was a pretty unsettling experience. One-dimensional monsters usually lack the subtlety to manipulate sufficient people to get their plans carried out, and this book sounds like another interesting insight into this aspect.

[Foxbat]

I know the footage you mean and you are absolutely right. There was something truly frightening to seeing a human side to this man.